Making Good
by PaulJNewell
Summary: Laying the groundwork for Breaking Bad - Season Six.


The call goes straight through to answer phone.

'I need a new dust filter for my Hoover MaxExtract PressurePro Model 60. Can you help me with that?' He hangs up the pay phone forcefully. The good thing about payphones is that they are robust. They can take some aggression. Something the man wasn't short of.

He waits. He doesn't have to wait long. The phone rings. A voice on the other end states a time and a place. Not that he needs to be told the place. It's the same place as last time.

And that's it. Simple as that. At least, it would be as simple as that – if he had the money. Dust filters for _Hoover MaxExtract PressurePro Model 60s_ don't come cheap. Especially euphemistic ones. In fact, those euphemistic dust filters are pretty darn expensive. And all he has is the shirt on his back. That's a euphemism too, but only just. He has the shirt on his back plus enough other clothes to keep him descent. And an old car that's almost out of gas. But nothing else. But no money. Not even a wallet. He had to beg a passer-by for the quarter he used to make the call. Not that that was difficult, given the state of him – particularly the scars down the right hand side of his face. He managed to pull off menacing without even trying to.

He gets in the car parked up beside him and turns the ignition key to the first click. The gas light comes on – a penetrating orange glow. He slams the wheel in frustration. He has thirty miles to where he needs to be and an hour to get there. He considers his options. He could try to make it, but if he stops short in the middle of nowhere he'll have to hitch the rest of the way – or run. Even in his fuzzy state of mind, that doesn't seem like a sound plan.

He glances at the driver-side mirror and sees a kid walking down the sidewalk toward the car – hoodie over his head, skateboard under his arm. The man gets out of the car.

'Hey,' he says to the kid with an upward nod of the head. 'Can you drive?'

The kid looks at him suspiciously. Then nods in return.

'Want a car?' the man adds.

The kid flashes a look of confusion. 'Huh? You crazy?'

'No, no, straight up,' the man insists.

Two other kids approach from over the road and stand by him. One of them was taller. Almost as tall as the man. 'What's up?' the big kid says.

'This guy wants to give us his car,' the first kid replies.

The man speaks hastily. 'Look, I need to be somewhere real important, but I got no money for gas. Give me a few bucks to put in the car, drive with me to the place and the car's yours. Swear. No messing.'

The three kids look at each other. One of them shakes his head. 'Dunno, sounds fucked up to me, man. How do we know this guy ain't gonna whack us or summit?'

'No, no. I'm not going to whack anyone. I don't have no weapon, see.' He holds his arms out. 'C'mon, I just need to be someplace real bad.' He pauses. The car is his only bargaining chip. They have to take it else he's finished. Then he realizes he has one other thing on his side. Age. He looks the first kid in the eye.

'Hey, I'll buy you some beer,' he offers. 'As much as you've got cash for.'

The boys look at each other again. Eventually they come to an unspoken conclusion and start pooling cash out of their pockets. They have almost forty bucks between them.

The man nods toward the car. 'Get in,' he says. 'Two of you will have to ride in the back. Keep your head down.' The car was a pickup with only two seats up front. 'Seriously, no messing. Don't want no cops pulling us over. Got it?'

At the next gas station, the man puts ten bucks of gas in the tank. With the rest he buys a packet of cigarettes, a lighter and as much beer as the remaining funds allow. Then he hits the road. Every few minutes he nervously glances in the rear-view mirror – checking his passengers are still out of sight.

The kid up front speaks. 'Where you going, mister?' he asks.

The man thinks for a moment before responding. 'Not _where_,' he says, in a dry voice. '_Who_.'

The kid doesn't understand. But he doesn't push it.

'What's the time, kid?'

The boy gets out his phone. 'Three-twenty.'

The man nods.

Thirty minutes later he is alone. In truth, more alone than he has ever been in his life. No friends. But, reassuringly, no enemies either. Except for the law – but they are no company. Everything tangible in his life was gone. Yet, tentatively, everything still lay ahead. He sits by the side of the road, leaning against a concrete block, smoking a cigarette. And waits. Waits for his new life to come pick him up.

Eventually, a car approaches. A red '91 Toyota Previa. It pulls in.

The man drags himself up from the sidewalk and gets in the passenger side, expecting it to pull away immediately. It doesn't.

The driver looks at the man, but doesn't say anything.

The passenger looks back, concerned for a moment, then offers one word by way of introduction.

'Jesse,' he says.

'I know who you are,' the driver responds flatly. He seems to consider things for a moment. Then pulls away swiftly.

'It really is a vacuum cleaner shop,' Jesse says when they enter the darkened premises of Best Quality Vacuum.

'I don't understand why that surprises people. It's a front. That's the idea.' It's a front for his primary operation. His operation of making people disappear – extracting them from their current situation. That's the role he plays in this underworld theatre to which Jesse is now very accustomed. He is The Extractor. He locks up the shutters behind them and turns to his client.

'For you Jesse, it's a hundred K. Upfront.'

'I don't have a hundred K.'

'Then you don't have a new identity.' He motions to reopen the shutters but Jesse steps into his path.

'Listen, yo, I wouldn't come here without something to offer.'

'I don't do _offers_. This isn't Macy's.' He flips a row of switches on the wall and lights flicker into action down the room. 'I do cash.'

Jesse takes a step closer to The Extractor. 'You know how much money Mr. White made?' he puts.

'Sure I do, a barrel load. Literally. I saw it.'

'Uh-uh,' Jesse half smiles. 'That's just a fraction. You didn't see the other seven.' Jesse leans in closer. 'I know where they are,' he whispers huskily.

The Extractor contemplates whether there is likely any truth in this statement and decides probably not. He walks over to a counter and begins tidying boxes. Jesse follows him.

'It's true, yo. Those guys, who robbed Mr. White – Jack and his men, I don't know if you know about any of that – anyway they took me with them. They did this.' He points to the deep scars down one side of his face. 'When I came round from this beating they were in the next room, all of them, drunk – laughing and shit. And talking. Talking about where to hide the money.'

The Extractor pauses from what he was doing and studies Jesse for a moment. 'If you know where it is, then why aren't you standing here with a hundred K?'

Jesse broke eye-contact. 'Because … because, I don't know _exactly_ where it is. But I know how to find it. I swear. I just need Saul.'

The Extractor shook his head. 'Saul's gone.'

'I know. He's gone as far as everyone else is concerned. But not _you. You_ know where he is now. You know _who_ he is.'

'No, I can't do that,' The Extractor says with a tone of finality. 'That's the point of my service. Gone means gone.' He slices a hand through the air to emphasize the fact.

Jesse grows more frantic. 'Look, I'll give you ten percent of what I recover. That's eight million dollars, yo. And Saul too. But I need a new identity, like yesterday. The cops are still looking for me. But I have _nothing._ You understand? I can't even buy food to eat. I don't have anywhere to stay. I even had to trade the car I was driving to get to you.' Jesse slammed his hands down on the counter. 'Jesus man, don't you understand? I have _nothing_.'

The Extractor looks Jesse up and down. 'You have _something_,' he says. Jesse looks blankly at him. 'You have a _skill_. And one that is now unique if I understand correctly the events of last night.'

Jesse recoils at the suggestion, stumbling back a few paces. 'No,' he utters. 'Not again. Never again.' He slumps backward onto a crate and drops his head into his hands. _Will this ever end_? – he thinks to himself. He rubs his tired face then runs his fingers through is lank hair. The money doesn't interest him. In truth, the freedom doesn't particularly interest him either. But he has a dependent now. Brock. He doesn't know where he is or who he's with, but he knows that it's his fault alone that Brock no longer has a mother – or a brother. He needs to know that he's okay. He needs to do what he can for him – before it's all over.

The Extractor approaches him. 'I'm not a gambling man, Jesse. I can't give you a new identity, tell you where Saul is, pack you on your way – and expect you to just return with eight million bucks.' He pauses. 'But, I tell you what I'll do. I'll set you up with some paperwork and a car. You go do a cook – or however many you need. I'm sure you know people who can steal you the equipment. Then, if you come back here and make good on the hundred K, I'll get message to Saul.'

Jesse looks up. He knows he has no choice. Mr. White's formula is no longer just a part of his mind. It is deeply programmed into muscle memory, from months of enforced repetition – day in, day out. It is his only asset. He nods, resignedly.

A beige RV stands in a remote sandy wasteland. Inside, Jesse Pinkman ties a black plastic apron around his waist and then pulls a gas mask tightly over his face. He stands motionless, staring at the equipment before him. He tries to put the thought out of his mind that events had gone full circle – because the thing about circles is that they go on forever. _This will not go on forever_, he thinks to himself. _This is the last time_.

END OF PART 1


End file.
